Price of the course: driving schools want to see a thaw

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QMI agency

Thursday, 25 January 2018 06:00

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Thursday, 25 January 2018 06:00

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“At the end of the roll”, driving schools in Quebec are calling for the liberalization of the price of driving lessons in Quebec, frozen since 2010.

Four organizations representing this sector are asking the Quebec government to do more to manage the price of driving lessons and the laws of the market prevail.

“It’s been more than eight years that the price of the driving course is frozen and that many of the ministers of Transport we have dangled that they would be indexed, but in the end, it is still nothing happened. What company could operate and continue to ensure the best possible quality, with prices frozen for eight years?”, one can read in a press release published Thursday.

The networks of the Association of driving schools of Quebec (AECQ), the Group Tecnic, the group co-operative driving schools independent Conduipro, as well as other driving schools, members of the canadian Federation of independent business (CFIB) have taken advantage of the awareness Week the paperwork for the CFIB to launch their cry of the heart.

“The schools are made at the end of the roll. It frees the industry from this regulation obsolete and we are allowed to set our prices in accordance with the laws of the market”, we read also in the press release.

The groups remind us that it is the ministry of Transport, which regulates the price of driving course. “The schools want to offer a quality service, but we can’t,” said Francois Lauziere, president of the board of directors of the AECQ.

General manager at Tecnic, Mylene Sevigny does, for example, explains why a school in Montreal must offer courses at the same price as another in the Gaspé peninsula, especially as the operating costs differ greatly.

“The current model is not working and should be reviewed as quickly as possible, she mentioned. While the costs of labour, maintenance of vehicles and the price of gasoline, for example, have continued to grow, the government has frozen the price of the course.”

Martine Hébert, senior vice-president and national spokesperson for CFIB hopes that the new minister of Transport, André Fortin, hear the cry of the heart, and act quickly, “if only for, in the very short term, the index price of the course, in the meantime to contemplate a liberalization of the prices”.